Asparagus and Avocado Salad

The beauty of this salad is that it is vibrant proof that some terrific ingredients simply deserve each other, even if the partnership doesn't come to mind immediately. A cookbook-writing friend came to the restaurant one day, ordered this asparagus and avocado combo, tasted it, and kept muttering, "Genius, genius!" Not me. Nature did it.

Preparation

1 Cut away about 2 inches of the base of each asparagus spear. With a vegetable peeler, shave the entire asparagus from bottom to top, reversing your grip and rotating as necessary to shave as much as possible. Don't rush it; be deliberate for the greatest precision.

2 Divide the asparagus strips among 4 salad plates. Cut each avocado half into 4 sections and place 2 wedges on each salad. Sprinkle with the mint leaves. Squeeze lime juice over the salads, drizzle evenly with the oil, and sprinkle with salt.

JIM LAHEY studied sculpture before learning the art of bread baking from bakers in Italy. In New York City, he opened the Sullivan Street Bakery in 1994 and Co., a pizza restaurant, in 2009. Sullivan Street Bakery was named one of the Top 10 Best Bread Bakeries in America by Bon Appétit in their January 2011 issuethe only New York-based bakery on the list. Lahey and his businesses have been featured in Vogue, Saveur, and the New York Times, and he has appeared on the Martha Stewart Show and NBC's Today. His first cookbook, My Bread, was a Gourmet Cookbook Club selection.